After having a small taste of what it is like to be dancing on stage... I'm itching to do it again! The excitment and thrill is exhilerating... my adrenaline was pumping in ways I've never experienced before... I'm definately ready and eager to be involved in another performance class and experience this thrill all over again.

I find it mesmerizing to watch a Casino Rueda circle in the clubs. Dancers switching partners back and forth, being very playful. I enjoy watching it freestyle in the club and I think it will be even MORE fun to watch if it was choreographed to a song where we can hit all the accents and be playful with the music. I think it will make a great performance!

Why would you want to watch casino ruedas from Italy and Vancouver when you can watch ruedas from Cuba? It is Cubans who taught these people in the ruedas or who are performing in these ruedas anyway. The dancing is these videos is not that difficult. For me, it is too showy and I dont like the rigidness.

Dancing relaxed is hard, but salsa newbies think it is easy or that they are beginners.

I am sure most salsa teachers in Toronto can't follow these ruedas, even the ones that reportedly say they can teach casino rueda. The problem is you need to learn to dance casino, apart from the ruedas. You can dance casino by yourself, with just one partner or with many couples. Casino is a dance like Cha Cha Cha or Bachata. You can't do your regular salsa dancing in ruedas. It just looks bad and some of the spins don't work out if you do North American salsa dancing.

Salsa is salsa and casino is casino. Hey, that's great you are a great salsa dancer, but if you want to learn casino, you have to start from the basic steps all over again like a salsa newbie. In fact, in Cuban casino, there is a call called "salsa", where you try to imitate North American salsa dancing. If you are in Cuban rueda and the leader shouts "salsa", you do your cross body leads straight leading with your hands pulling on your partner's hands and you do the quick multiple spins in the same place like North American salsa dancing.

Most advanced salsa dancers treat casino ruedas as an add on to their existing salsa knowledge or as a good way to make a show to audience. Most salsa dancers have never taken a course in just pure casino.

If you think you can dance the real casino or the real casino rueda, come to every Sunday at 5pm to 7pm at LURIN TAPAZ at 1032 St Clair Avenue West, Oakwood and Dufferin. It is a small Peruvian restaurant on the second floor, where Vladimir Aranda leads his regular Casino Rueda classes, the longest continous running casino classes in Toronto (the same people for over 5-6 years)

It is also a bar/nightclub with a handful of people with no cover, so you don't have to pay for the class or you can just remain anonymous in the background. Later on, they just play music and the few remaining people just dance. But if you can keep up with these people, you can call yourself as casinero as opposed to a salsero.

At Lurin Tapaz, there will be a Cuban event this Saturday and a Casino Rueda practice THIS Sunday from 5pm to 8pm for the people in Vladimir's classes (no charge). Anyone who does casino rueda in Toronto is invited. Are you up for the challenge? Just check it out and widen your salsa horizons.

Why would I want to watch casino rueda from Italy and Vancouver? Same reason as why anyone in Toronto or anywhere outside of Cuba and Puerto Rico would want to dance any kind of salsa. Does the fact that it does not come from Cuba make it inferior? Should we feel any lessor about ourselves as salsa dancers in North America? Probably only as much as we should feel lessor about ourselves for not speaking the Queen's English.

That said, I love the two cuban rueda videos you've posted timbero1. They are fantastic and shows us how casino is danced from where it originates. Though not many of us in Toronto grew up in the same environment where dance is simply part of life - those videos certainly opens our eyes. At the same time, we make do with the limits of where we are and the environment we are in.

There is a fine line between purism and elitism. I find that neither increases my enjoyment of salsa._________________Alfred

You are right about salsa. I think salsa has evolved in North America into LA, NY style and on 2, which looks different and has different choreography. A lot of good dancers have never been to Latin America, but there are still excellent. Where there is some debate about the origins of salsa, no there is no debate about casino rueda.

Casino rueda is from Cuba. Casino rueda is not very popular in North America and Europe. How many casino rueda courses are happening now in the city? Therefore, has not developed on its own in Vancouver or Italy. Most of the casino people learn In North America comes from Miami and the casino in Miami is stuck in a time warp before the Cuban revolution because anything that resembles dancing after the revolution would be considered Communist dancing.

Maybe one day when casino rueda becomes popular in North American, it can develop its own choreography and styling. Right now, this hasn't happened.

In the Vancouver Rueda, all the choreography is from Cuba. Somebody Cuban or somebody who studied Cuban rueda was responsible for the choreography. However, you can see still that some of the dancers probably dance North American style in the footwork and spins.

Italy is the place where Cuban style dancing or casino rueda is most popular in Europe. There are a lot of Cubans in Italy teaching as you can see in the video.

The bar of standard is set much higher in Cuba for Casino Rueda, because more people dance it.

If somebody offered me a Canadian taco as opposed to Mexican taco, I would probably take the Mexican taco. Maybe after years of development and popularity maybe the Canadian taco can become as good as the Mexican one. Right now, Japanese cars are better than American cars, but how many years and how billions of dollars did that take?

It is not elitism. It is reality. How many people in the world would rather watch the Canadian national soccer team than the Brazilian one? Soccer is not from Brazil, but has developed in leagues with millions of people playing for years.

A more interesting question for you may be why did you happen to choose these casino rueda videos? Why wasn't a Cuban one included in your choices? Maybe it was because some of the dancers dance similar to North American style or some of the costumes, lightniing, or choreography appeal more to North American tastes ? These videos appeal to what an exotic Latin America looks like with all the glitter and stereotypes. Or maybe it is a matter of access, it is harder to find Cuban videos and they are more in Spanish.

But did you notice in the Cuban videos that they move differently and they do the basic steps differently ? This is casino dancing as opposed to salsa dancing.

Apart from most areas of Quebec, everybody speaks English or has to speak English to get a decent job in Canada. Millions speak English everyday to communicate at work and school and with their family and friends. You are right it would be absurd to compare Canadian and the British English.

But with Casino Rueda, it is different.

I would say most Cubans have seen and even participated in a Casino Rueda in their life.
I have been to Vancouver and I can safely say 99% of the people have NEVER danced Casino Rueda in their life. Out of the regular salsa dancers in Vancouver, I would say 90% have never participated comfortably in a casino rueda ever.

LURIN TAPAZ at 1032 St Clair Avenue West at Oakwood and Dufferin.
It is a small Peruvian restaurant above a fish store. A rueda class with Vladimir
starts at 5pm, but you can come later if you want just to dance. No cover.
People start dancing after 6pm and most people leave before 10pm.